Ode to Alcatraz: How the Rock went from ‘perfect...

1of19Alcatraz Federal Prison as seen from the south on Sept. 3, 1952.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

2of19Alcatraz seen from the east as a boat approaches the island on Sept. 3, 1952.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

3of19The Oct. 13, 1933, Chronicle reports on the announcement that the former U.S. Army disciplinary barricades on Alcatraz Island will be turned into a federal prison for dangerous criminals.Photo: The Chronicle 1933

11of19“The view no one wants” was how Chronicle photographer Barney Peterson described this shot. Those are the guard’s quarters in the foreground on Sept. 3, 1952.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

12of19Lighthouse keeper Edward Schneider, shown on September 3, 1952, had worked on the island not far from the prison for 21 years.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

13of19The guard lowers the key to unlock the cable that holds the boat on Alcatraz on Sept. 3, 1952.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

14of19A visit to Alcatraz, September 3, 1952 The Coast Guard lighthouse, which i the oldest on the coast, and can be seen by ships 20 miles away.Photo: Barney Peterson, The Chronicle

15of19Lighthouse keeper Edward Schneider, 54, shown on Sept. 3, 1952, says he hopes to be stationed for 10 more years. He believes there isn’t the isolation there that he sees at most lighthouses.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

16of19An officer has his gun ready in the tower on Alcatraz on Sept. 3, 1952.Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

19of19The Chronicle of Nov. 27, 1973, covers the first public tours to Alcatraz as part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.Photo: The Chronicle 1973

If you dig around, you’ll find a lot of stories about the Rock.

The news that the annual Alcatraz prison reunions were coming to an end prompted a dive into The Chronicle’s archive, and it didn’t take long to find long-buried packs of negatives that showed the island penitentiary in the 1950s, as well as stories from the 1930s onward that tell tales from behind bars and even into the icy waters of San Francisco Bay.

Military prisoners had been housed in the middle of the bay for almost a century before federal inmates made their way to the Rock. Alcatraz was a military outpost in the 19th century and through the Civil War, before being transferred from the Department of War to the Department of Justice on Oct. 12, 1933.

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In Washington, D.C., Attorney General Homer Cummings announced that Alcatraz was chosen as a new prison site because of its ideal location for confinement of “incorrigibles” and dangerous prisoners who were likely to attempt escape. “It’s positioned a mile from the nearest shore, in the midst of currents,” he was quoted in The Chronicle as saying, “and its record of never a single successful escape makes Alcatraz a perfect federal prison.”

The first criminals arrived on Aug. 11, 1934, and by Aug. 16, there were 47 on the island. The “Rock stars” of the prison system arrived the next week. Al Capone set foot on the island on Aug. 20, 1934. The Chronicle’s insight: “Capone sagged at his first glimpse of the prison.” By Sept. 3, George “Machine Gun” Kelly and notorious kidnappers Harvey Bailey and Albert Bates would be keeping Capone company.

As time went on, it became impractical to continue holding prisoners on the Rock. The buildings on the island were crumbling, and federal authorities thought the costs to rehabilitate the prison were prohibitive. The degree of deterioration hit home when prisoners Frank Morris and Clarence and John Anglin used spoons to chip their way out of the supposedly escape-proof prison.

On March 22, 1963, the final 27 prisoners left the island. The next day’s Chronicle reported: “Alcatraz is a prison no more. It’s just a crumbling piece of federal real estate with an uncertain future.”

Frank C. Weatherman, the last convict to step off the island that day in 1963, didn’t mince words: “This place is hell,” he said. “Alcatraz never was no good for anybody.”

It would be 10 years before the public got a look at what some called Devil’s Island. On Nov. 26, 1973, the Golden Gate National Recreation Area of the U.S. Park Service began tours of Alcatraz, with 700 visitors taking the 15-minute boat ride to be greeted by 11 rangers serving as guides.

Alcatraz remains a hot ticket today, with more than 1.5 million annual visitors. The first day was no different. “All space on this weekend’s sailings is already taken,” park Superintendent William J. Whalen told The Chronicle in 1973. “In fact, we’re nearly booked solid for weeks to come.”

Ed Mack, a 63-year-old bellman for the Huntington Hotel who was in the first batch of visitors, put things in perspective: “It’s nice to check out the same day you check in.”

Alcatraz, shown on Sept. 3, 1952, provided a great view of San Francisco available to only the prisoners and the 300 or so employees and their families who lived on the island.

Photo: Barney Peterson / The Chronicle 1952

More from Chronicle Vault

•Prison under siege: The Chronicle’s front page from May 3, 1946, reports on an Alcatraz gunbattle that killed one guard and wounded many more. “Rioting desperadoes ... turned the federal penitentiary there into an inferno of gunfire in one of the bloodiest prison uprisings in California history,” the story read.

•Escape gone wrong: “Four freedom-hungry desperadoes cracked out of Alcatraz in a thick fog early yesterday. They all gambled their lives and two of them lost, riddled as they swam; the other two were recaptured, one in the water, the other cowering in a cave on the island.” Read the story from April 4, 1943.

Bill Van Niekerken is the Library Director of the San Francisco Chronicle. He does research for reporters and editors and manages the photos, negatives and text archives. He has a weekly column “From the Archive”, that focuses on photo coverage of historic events. For this column Bill scans and publishes 20-30 images from photos and negatives that haven’t been seen in many years.

Bill started working at the Mercury News in 1980, when nothing in news libraries was digital. Research was done using paper clippings, and cameras shot film. He moved to the Chronicle in 1985, just as the library was beginning their digital text archive.